


rolling thunder

by holsmi



Series: an open road, driven together [3]
Category: The End Of The Fucking World (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/M, Mention of attempted rape, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, inappropriate and ineffective use of british slang, mentions of PTSD/Flasbacks, season 2 non-compliant, two kids in love getting therapy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-14
Updated: 2019-11-14
Packaged: 2021-01-30 13:17:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21428857
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/holsmi/pseuds/holsmi
Summary: “You’re not worried about this?” He pointed to his bullet. “This doesn’t bother you?”She grabbed the packaging from his hands. “Okay, sure I’m bothered. Look at me. I’m a wreck.” She didn’t look bothered, or a wreck. “But see here?” She pointed to the stickers. “This person, whoever the fuck they are, has no clue we moved. Why should we care?”
Relationships: Alyssa/James (The End of the Fucking World)
Series: an open road, driven together [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1539334
Comments: 18
Kudos: 97





	rolling thunder

**Author's Note:**

> brief season 2 rewrite, in the same universe as the previous two stories in this series. Follows the premise that James and Alyssa were together for the two years in between seasons

James looked at the bullet in horror. His name was etched in the metal in jagged lettering, and the bullet itself sat in a plush box, like a treasured piece of jewelry.

“Fucking cunt can’t even spell my goddamned name right,” Alyssa said before throwing the whole package into the bin. They were behind her aunt’s cafe; this didn’t seem to him the type of conversation you casually have in front of others.

“What?”

“My name. It’s spelled wrong on the bullet.”

They both got packages on the same day, with large “change of address” stickers on them. James was clearly distraught, while Alyssa was taking it more in stride.

“You’re not worried about this?” He pointed to his bullet. “This doesn’t bother you?”

She grabbed the packaging from his hands. “Okay, sure I’m bothered. Look at me. I’m a wreck.” She didn’t look bothered, or a wreck. “But see here?” She pointed to the stickers. “This person, whoever the fuck they are, has no clue we moved. Why should we care?”

That was true, he supposed. His was addressed to his dad’s house and hers to her mum’s old place. She moved ages ago and he hadn’t been back since his dad passed. They had just finished the ordeal of packing up the house, getting it ready for selling. There might be a buyer lined up, but he was letting an agent handle it.

He peeked at her, and James could tell from her face that she knew she won him over. She took the box from his hands, closed the lid, and threw it neatly over one shoulder into the bin behind her. She grabbed his hand and led him back into the cafe, head high and unnecessarily smug, saying, “Who the fuck even spells Alyssa with one “s” anyways?”

Still, James went back later to fish the bullets out of the trash and hid them in the car. Just in case.

–

After the beach, after everything, it took them awhile to be anywhere near okay–what with the threat of prison, the threat of never being able to walk, of separation looming over them. Even when those passed, the ever looming presence of their families was there, too. 

The first time they went away together, just for a weekend, it felt like fleeing but in a good way. Leaving grief and everything that ever hurt them behind. 

They drove away from James’s house after his dad pulled them both into a hug. When Alyssa looked in the rearview mirror, she could see Phil waving them off.

“I’m surprised he doesn’t have a fucking hanky. The fuck’s this? The Titanic?” she said and he laughed.

–

They ended up driving a lot, not going much of anywhere. Sometimes they wanted to see something specific, or were following a recommendation from someone at the cafe, but James felt like he’d be happy going anywhere if it were with Alyssa.

On one of those early trips, they stopped in a town and popped into a bookshop to use the restroom. James went to the toilet while Alyssa browsed.

Leaving the restroom, James found Alyssa entirely still in front of a display of books. He could see her face, completely blank, a void. 

“Alyssa?” he called her name softly, to not startle her. It was pointless, because her eyes snapped to him, and then back to the display, and then she ran from the store.

He called after her and was answered by the bell on the door, chiming as it shut.

James turned to the display and saw Clive Koch’s smarmy face and–

The tape, those pictures, the girls, all ran through his mind. The smell of blood mixed with bleach, the feeling of blood gushing past his fingers.

Alyssa pleading, the look on her face, her covered in blood and–

James could feel his heart pounding, the ambient noise of the bookshop drowned out by the beating. He realized he was breathing harder, near gasping. He took a step back, unaware of his feet moving, and bumped into another patron.

An older woman with kind eyes had her hand reached out–to hurt? to help? to capture?–and his feet stuttered away from her until he, too, was out the door.

The air was cooler outside the shop, and James took in a few ragged breaths. He couldn’t see Alyssa on the street and he felt jittery as he walked to the car. She wasn’t there, either, and he called her name again.

James whipped his head up and down the street and didn’t see her. He caught a woman’s attention and, “Have you seen a girl around here? Brown hair?” He gestured with his hand her approximate height, “About this tall?” 

The woman pointed in a direction and he followed, thanking her profusely. 

He ducked his head into each shop, each alleyway, down the rest of the block. He hit an intersection and saw a bus stop awning, and Alyssa hunched over on the bench, his eye caught by her bright red jumper.

James sat down beside her, gingerly, leaving space between them. Her head was buried in her knees, hugged to her chest. She softly rocked herself back and forth. He raised one hand to touch her shoulder, but instead moved both hands to his knees. His hands briefly clenched into fists in restraint; he was desperate to touch her, to offer her any comfort. 

He said her name, but he was so quiet he thought for a moment that she hadn’t heard him. She must have, though, because her head snapped up towards him, eyes wide, scared.

Alyssa looked at him for a moment before turning away to look ahead of her, staring at the middle distance. She rested her chin on her knees. “I keep seeing his face,” she said. “I keep hearing his voice. And then the way he looked when you… The way his blood…” she trailed off and then shouted, “Fuck!” She hid her face in her knees again and her body tensed as she squeezed her legs.

“Alyssa,” he said again. His mouth hung open as he worked for something to say. Finally he asked, “Can I touch you?” He heard her exhale deeply and she nodded.

James scooted over to her on the bench until their thighs touched. He put one arm around her back and placed his free hand on her knee. Alyssa leaned into him and he put his cheek on the top of her head.

He didn’t know how to convey that he had the same reaction, that he too felt like he was back there, transported with a knife in his hand. He stayed silent and hoped she understood.

They drove back to the cafe not long after, deciding to cut the rest of their holiday short. 

When they arrived, the car in park, James broke the silence and said, “I think we should go to therapy.”

Alyssa sparked with anger, “What?! I’m not fucking mental. Who the fuck are you to say that I need fucking therapy?” She unbuckled, got out of the car and slammed the door. She opened the back door, grabbed her bag, and slammed that one too. Before walking away, she leaned through the car window and said, “You can eat shit, James.”

James watched her go and wondered just how he fucked it up this badly. He stared at the steering wheel and sat there, for lack of any better options. Alyssa was never going to talk to him again and–the door wrenched open and Alyssa climbed back in.

She didn’t look at him and he didn’t look at her. “You said “we”,” she said.

“Yeah.”

“You don’t think I’m mad?”

“No.”

They still weren’t looking at he each other.

“You think you need therapy, too?”

James took a deep breath and said, “Looking at his face made me want to vomit, right there in the shop, and my heart felt like…” He put his hand on his chest and trailed off. “My dad suggested it. Talks about wanting me to see someone about my mum. I–I think it could help us with this.”

“Fine,” she said, and got out of the car. He stayed in his seat, unsure of what she wanted him to do. 

It took her a moment to realize he wasn’t next to her and she called back to the car, “Aren’t you coming?”

James scrambled out of the car after her.

–

And it did help. It helped both of them to not feel like they were constantly fleeing the past, but rather that it was part of them. 

James tried to use a breathing exercise he learned in therapy and was succeeding only marginally. 

“Wait,” said DC Eunice Noon, “they have your names etched into them?” 

James adjusted the phone to his other ear. “Yeah,” he replied. “Sent to old addresses.”

“Well, that’s something,” she said.

James and DC Noon didn’t really have any relationship to speak of. He owed her a lot, actually, for forgiving them for pistol whipping her and then for testifying on his behalf. The day his sentence was suspended, she gave him her card. It’d been stashed in his wallet ever since, but this seemed like a good time to break it out. 

“I can’t say I’ve heard anything,” she said. “Bastard only really had his mum, far as we could tell. I’ll keep an eye out and let you know, yeah? Is this a good number for you?”

He confirmed and thanked her, hanging up the phone. He rested his head against the phone booth and hoped that did something for them.

–

“Do you know what Todd said to me the other day?” Alyssa asked from the passenger seat.

“What?”

“He said that Finland wasn’t real; made up by the Russians in the Cold War.”

“Yeah,” James said. “That makes sense.” They both nodded for a moment before smiling.

Alyssa liked Todd, and she knew James did, too. They both had a hard time making new friends, but Todd was like a puppy; he was hard not to like. 

She looked over her shoulder to the backseat–Phil was still safely buckled. Alyssa wanted to make a joke about getting a car seat for the urn, but she knew how deep that hurt went in James. Also, she wasn’t convinced he wouldn’t take that suggestion seriously and then get one. 

It took James a long time to figure out what to do with Phil’s ashes. She would have been okay with keeping them in the living room of the flat they got after the wedding, but he said that he wanted to spread them in the park where Phil and James’s mum first met.

The park had been turned into an underpass, the internet told them after a bit of searching, but that it was okay. It was the thought that counted. That’s where they were headed there and not in any kind of rush. 

Alyssa saw a girl, a little older than them, looking like she wanted to hitch. Alyssa thought briefly of them, back in the beginning. Newly free, with only an exploded car behind them, strangers to themselves.

“We should stop for her,” she said.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Better us than some freak.”

James said, “Okay,” and pulled over. 

She rolled down her window and leaned out, “Hey! You alright?”

The young woman walked over to the car and leaned down with a sweet smile and said, “Hello.”

–

Bonnie, they learned, was going to her sister’s house a couple of towns over. Out of their way, Alyssa thought, but worth it to help her out.

Alyssa used to be unable to stand silence, felt the need to fill it with chatter, and she learned the value of comfortable silence with someone you knew well enough to not need words. But, Bonnie was the kind of quiet that turned the silences awkward.

Both her and James tried to force some conversation, but she responded to each attempt with soft short answers that didn’t lead to further discussion. Bonnie asked them questions too, like where they were going and when they got married. (“A month or so ago,” James answered, smiling. It was easier to go with the wedding date, and not their elopement a month prior. Bonnie’s expression changed, hard for a second, before fading back into neutral pleasantness).

Alyssa was afraid that this would be how the next couple hours would be–suffocating in the silence–when the fucking car broke down.

They all got out of the car and she said, “What the fuck’s wrong with the car, James? This thing is the bane of our life.” This wasn’t the first time the car broke down on them. Not the second or third time, either, but they couldn’t bear to part with it, not yet. Sentiment.

He said back, “Shut up,” and she looked at him. He had a bashful smile on his face, some pink high on his cheeks, and she realized how she phrased it.

Alyssa punched him lightly on the shoulder. He was a sap, and it was embarrassing, but 

how she loved him.

Bonnie looked at the tire, crouched, and asked, “Is there a spare?”

Alyssa groaned and James answered, “That was the spare.”

She said, “I’m going for a walk, see what’s around,” and left James and Bonnie behind.

–

Alyssa looked around their motel room, at the outlandishly bad decor and the truly shit looking bed, and decided that they’d stayed in worse places.

The situation was eating at her, though. She sat in the decrepit arm chair and her fingers worried the loose threads in the stitching. 

“Something’s off with Bonnie,” she said. “And the guy at the desk, too. He’s fucking weird.”

They had to stay the night-no one could come for their car until morning, and she hated the delay. She didn’t want to be near that creep, and she wasn’t sure she wanted to be near Bonnie any longer than necessary.

“Him, yeah. He’s off. Bonnie could just be quiet, though.” James could be a little defensive about quiet people. “I think we should ask her for a drink, to say thanks. For paying for our room.”

Places like this only took cash, which was fucking stupid, and there wasn’t a card machine for miles.

“Yeah, alright.”

Drinks were weird, and they didn’t stay long. As they drank, Bonnie moved from from shy and quiet to fucking cryptic (“You’re quite small up close,” she said to James, like that made any fucking sense.). She lost all interest in staying when the motel owner forced his way into their pseudo conversation.

It was still early when they got back to the room, and James locked the door behind them. He checked the lock, tugging on it, and said, “Okay. You were right about Bonnie. She’s definitely weird.”

Normally, Alyssa would take a moment to enjoy a victory, but nothing about this felt good.

She took Phil’s urn from him and said, “I don’t want to talk about Bonnie right now.” She put Phil in the bathroom and closed the door. She got into his space and kissed him. He kissed her back, melting into her with the ease of familiarity. James put his hands in her hair and she tugged up on his shirt, and they fell into bed together. 

Alyssa didn’t feel any better about any of it the next morning. They found Bonnie practically still fucking the motel owner and the mechanic told them that their tire had been stabbed. She asked them if anyone was out to get them and she was only half-joking when she suggested Bonnie. 

Alyssa felt like Bonnie was lingering, like she was trying to prolong the trip on purpose. She and James stopped a lot on their road trips–but that was usually just to make out, and they couldn’t very well do that when Bonnie was throwing up on the side of the road.

She told James that while they waiting for-fucking-ever for Bonnie outside of the chemist’s, after he’d gone to a cash machine to pay Bonnie back, and he understood where she was coming from. Bonnie came back to the car with a fresh sheen of sweat on her brow, looking pained. “I need to eat,” was all she said. 

Lunch was worse; apparently Bonnie’s boyfriend was murdered, and frankly the word “murdered” was used too many times for her liking. They tried to offer condolences, but Bonnie only reacted to them with suspicion. She was on the offensive, and neither of them could figure out why. 

Bonnie’d all but ran back to the chemist after lunch, leaving James and Alyssa waiting in the car again. Minutes ticked by and James said, “she said her sister’s not far.”

“We know she has the cash for a taxi,” she replied.

They looked at each other, and she raised an eyebrow. “Right,” he said, leaving her carton of leftovers on the ground in the car park and putting the car in drive.

–

The underpass was nice, as far as underpasses went. She looked around and tried to imagine the park that once stood here. Imagine Phil meeting a sad, sweet blond lady and falling in love with her in an instant.

“Uh, Alyssa?” James caught her attention and showed her the inside of the urn. “I think my dad got wet.”

She raised her eyebrows, “he’s like a paste.” James didn’t look consoled. “It’s still him,” she said. “We can still take him home, you know.”

James thought about it for a moment before sighing. “No, he’d want to be here.”

He reached his hand into the urn and scooped out some of the ashes. They had both imagined this moment to be peaceful, but sad, with the ashes drifting off in the wind. The splat of them hitting the pavement blew that day dream away for them.

“Maybe I should just–” he started before tipping over the urn and letting the rest of the ashes fall out as he shook it. Despite the unfortunate circumstances, this really is where Phil would have wanted to be.

They hugged for a long time back at the car, after James wiped his hands on a rag in the boot, and felt contentment in each other.

–

James brought Alyssa to the cafe after they got back, the delay meaning that she had to work that night. He was driving back to their flat, listening to music when he saw a car zoom past him in the opposite direction. 

His brain stopped for a moment, stalled in the effort of reconciling Bonnie, now driving a car, heading towards the cafe–towards Alyssa. He made a u-turn and followed, his eyes flickering between the road and the speedometer and as sped to catch up.

He followed her to the lake house and then to a dirt road near the cafe, a weight slowly settling in his stomach. That weight crashed when, in her car, he found Clive Koch’s book, words of love inscribed in the front. Their pictures, torn from a newspaper, were placed between the book’s cover and the front page.

“Oh shit,” he said. “Oh shit, shit, shit, shit–”

–

The cafe was pretty dead, and Alyssa was just waiting for Jerry to finish her meal before she could close. She heard the bell at the front door ring and–”Bonnie? What are you doing here?”

As she rounded the counter, Bonnie held out to her a jumper. It was brown and one of James’s. “I think it got mixed up in my things,” she said.

Alyssa took the jumper, wary, and said, “Thanks. How did you know where I was?”

Bonnie, still with that weird, serene smile, said, “You and James mentioned a cafe. Can’t say there’s many around here.”

Alyssa nodded. That, at least on the surface, passed for making sense. She looked at Bonnie and wondered what you should say to someone you abandoned in a car park. “Do you want a scone?”

“Yeah,” Bonnie said. “Do you have any water?”

–

_Oh shit, shit, shit, shit, shit, _James thought, hitting the phone receiver. “I need help!” he said into the phone, quiet and urgent. He’d called 999, but the person on the other line couldn’t hear him. “Please send help!” He repeated before hanging up. He tried calling DC Noon, too, for good measure but she couldn’t hear him, either. James fucking hated the reception they got at the lake.

Whatever he thought would happen when he caught up with Bonnie, her pulling a gun out of her waistband, alone in the cafe with Alyssa, was not high on that list. 

“Fuck,” he said to himself, before sneaking in the back door of the cafe.

–

Bonnie looked like shit, Alyssa thought from across the table, and even more awkward than normal. She asked where James was and Alyssa said, “He headed home already.”

“You could phone him. Get him here.”

“Why would I want to do that?” She had already planned on staying the night here, crashing with her mum. When Bonnie didn’t reply, she asked, “What’s going on, Bonnie? Are you okay?” 

“I told you, just returning this.” She gestured at the jumper.

“Yeah, thanks.” Alyssa didn’t say anything else.

Eventually, Bonnie said, “And I wanted to see you both again.”

“Why? What for?”

Bonnie pulled out a gun. Alyssa stared at it and thought, 

  
  


“I think you knew my boyfriend,” Bonnie said.

“What?”

–

“Yeah, you killed him,” James heard Bonnie say from where he was crouched behind a counter in the kitchen. He didn’t think he could bank on help coming any time soon.

He heard Jerry try to settle her tab and wondered what would happen next. When the bells rang, signally that they were alone, they started talking again. Alyssa asked Bonnie if she was the one to send the bullets. And then Alyssa sassed the woman with the gun for spelling her name wrong.

He married a beautiful, brave, and fucking reckless woman.

–

Alyssa was scared, but indignant, as she recounted what happened at the professor’s house, with the man they killed. She’d talked about it loads in therapy, but her therapist never made her do it with a gun on the table–it created a new edge.

Bonnie kept trying to deny it, like Alyssa didn’t remember that night in detail, but that only made her feel stronger. Alyssa was almost happy to shatter the image Bonnie had built up of Clive in her mind. 

Then the police officer came in and ordered a fucking strudel instead of noticing the madwoman with the gun.

–

James stared through the window connecting the kitchen to the rest of the cafe, looking for any visual sign of what was happening.

He finally, finally saw Alyssa and caught her eye. He tried to smile encouragingly at her, and she held his gaze for a moment, smiling back.

–

Alyssa’d never been so happy and so sad to see anyone. She wanted him nowhere near this, but couldn’t bear thinking he was anywhere else now that she’d seen him. Most of all, though, she kind of wanted to kiss him.

She turned back to the officer to give him his fucking strudel. She almost wanted him to leave, if he wasn’t going to be any help. He asked for cream, and she sprayed him the smallest possible amount in retaliation. 

Then he started going off on how there was a murder at a motel near here. Alyssa had to school her face as she stared at Bonnie. She hadn’t been fucking the motel owner, Bonnie had been murdering him and stuffing him in a wardrobe. Maybe both. 

  
  


Alyssa tried to get him to take the receipt, written on it, but he left them there and taking all hope of seeing tomorrow with him.

Bonnie pointed the gun at her and told her to lock the door.

–

James was near hyperventilating in the kitchen, the knives in his hands glinting in the light as his hands shook. He tried to reach for a third knife, just in case, but his leg was so stiff and–

  
He winced as the knife hit the floor, so loud in the quiet that it was deafening. He tried to crouch back against the counter, as if that would hide him again.

It didn’t work.

–

Alyssa sat next to James, staring past Bonnie’s gun to her face. She was going to be pissed if this is how they died.

She felt pity for Bonnie, though, as much pity as you can have for someone trying to kill you.

“Tell me what happened that night.”

“Your boyfriend tried to rape me, so James stabbed him.” 

Bonnie cried out and demanded, “Stop lying!”

“That’s the truth!” James said. 

“This is bullshit!” Alyssa said. “You must have known about the other girls. There were loads of them.”

“That was never proven!”

“There were pictures, a video. How do you know he didn’t have plans for you?” 

“It was different for me!”

James tried to get her to stop talking, and it might have been a good idea, but she said, “Maybe you just got lucky.”

Bonnie stopped for a moment, eyes wide, before her expression hardened and she raised her gun at them. “No,” she said. “No, he loved me. You killed him. You took him from me.”

“No! I–” James started, her self-sacrificing idiot. “I killed him. Please let her go.”

“Fuck off, James,” Alyssa said, looking at him. “You’re not doing this again.” She turned to Bonnie. “Yeah, we killed him.” 

–

Bonnie stood there for a long time, unmoving. James said her name, but it took a couple of tries before she looked at either of them. She asked them what to do with the pain she felt. Alyssa answered, “You get help, and you figure it out.”

Bonnie nodded and said, “Okay.” She lowered the gun for a moment, and then raised it, pointing it under her chin.

Alyssa shouted, “No!” as they tackled her. They got her to the ground, sliding the gun out of reach. They felt her struggle and then start to cry. She stopped fighting as flashing lights filled the cafe. Police officers and DC Noon burst through the door.

–

After they gave their statements, they headed back to their apartment. James tried to talk on the ride, but it didn’t sit well with Alyssa, talking about nothing after nearly dying. She appreciated him for the effort, though. 

She put her hand on his arm and said, “Thanks.” He covered her hand with one of his, and she knew that he understood.

When they got home, they took turns showering and then put on their sleep clothes, despite it being only three in the afternoon. They crowded the sink brushing their teeth side by side and crawled into bed. They laid on the sides, looking at each other.

“That was fucking shit,” Alyssa said.

“Yeah.”

“Do you think she only had him?”

“Might have. Must have been lonely, though.” 

“That’s sad.”

“Yeah. I told Noon about it. I hope she can help Bonnie, get her treatment, or whatever help she needs,” James said, and she could picture him doing that. He put a hand on her cheek and stroked her cheekbone. “I’m so glad you're okay,” he said, and she didn’t save to see his face to know his expression: choked up looking smile, eyes all squinty as he tried and failed not to cry.

“Yeah. Me, too, despite your best efforts. You can just do that, James. We’re a team.”

“I know. I know. I’m sorry. Bonnie had the gun pointed at you and I had to do something and… I’m sorry.”

“You could have been hurt, too, James. How many times do you think you can get shot and live?” She sighed. ”You mean too much to me to be that stupid.”

He pulled her to him and she went, pillowing her head on his shoulder and tangling their legs together.

“I love you, too,” he said.

She laughed, “Yeah, go on about it.”

**Author's Note:**

> and then they built a tiny house and just fucking travelled FOREVER


End file.
